Love Letter
by ElleCC
Summary: Tattward & Inkella entry. "I used to stare at the sketchbook. Now I stare in the mirror. I study each line, each sweep of the pen, of the needle. Was it just a design or did each line have meaning?" AH, Jasper, one-shot.


**Tattward & Inkella One-Shot Contest**

**Title: Love Letter**

**Pen name: ElleCC**

**Characters: Jasper (minor Bella, Edward)**

**Disclaimer: Jasper owns me, not the other way around.**

**To see other entries in the Tattward & Inkella Contest, please visit the C2 page:  
****www(dot)fanfiction(dot)net/community/Tattward_and_Inkella_Contest/71624/**

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_**Love Letter**_

Monday, July 13, 2009 

It burned.

The simple linework wasn't bad, but he was shading, and that was more painful.

The needle buzzing was high-pitched and grating and my ears stung along with my skin. I tensed, wanting to be done, waiting for my silence and solitude.

Edward must have felt my muscles tighten under the hand that was on my shoulder blade. He murmured, quiet and reassuring, "I'm almost done, man. Relax."

I forced myself to release the tension. The burn was good. It's been five sessions, thirty-five hours, and it was moments from being complete. My chest, covered with alternately thin and thick black ink, was complete more than six months ago. My back took longer. I wanted the timing to be perfect. Almost a year to the day, he was adding the final lines.

"Ten more minutes, max."

Eleven minutes later, he wiped away excess ink and blood, applied a thin layer of ointment.

"You want to see before I cover it?"

I shook my head. He expected that but asked anyway, and quickly applied gauze and tape when I declined.

I never look, not since the first one, until I'm home, alone.

As I was stretching and tugging my shirt over my head, and he was cleaning his station, he spoke again, voice still low.

"Bella's expecting you for dinner on Saturday. She wanted me to remind you she's making her chili. You still in?"

I glanced at him as I pulled on my jacket, wincing as the bottom brushed my back unexpectedly. His eyes suggested he was expecting me to say no and, at the same time, hoping I wouldn't.

"Yeah, I'm in."

He nodded, a controlled movement that didn't reflect the relief I saw in his suddenly relaxed shoulders.

"All right, we'll see you then. Call if you have any problems. You know the drill."

I shook his hand. We settled the tab for his work eight months ago even though he was adamant at first that he would refuse any payment; I paid for it all up front when he eventually relented. I also have a line on an antique piano for which he's been looking. I can try to say thank you with words, but I'll never be able to convey what I really mean. My words fail regularly.

I nodded to Kate as I passed by the counter in the storefront. "Come back soon, Jasper," she called after me, "when you've decided about the sleeves."

I don't plan to go back, even though I humored her by discussing complementary ideas for my arms. The original design is complete. There is no vision past this. I have accomplished what I intended.

. . . . . . . .

Saturday, July 18, 2009

I went to Edward and Bella's for chili tonight as I promised. It is nice to have the companionship sometimes, and they're easy to be with, as they always have been. Bella tried to coax me into their conversations but never pressed too hard.

After dinner, she asked, looking timid, "Can I see? Now that it's done?"

I stood and slowly unbuttoned my shirt. I've taken to wearing dark shirts so that the ink doesn't show through and the one I was wearing was navy – the one with the thin stripes. I watched her face as I slid the shirt from my shoulders and she stepped closer, examining, assessing. I turned around so she could see her husband's finishing touches. It still looks rough but she's pretty familiar with the tattoo healing process – Edward's half-covered, although he hasn't gotten anything new in almost a year and refuses to even consider it; her own arm and shoulder reflect some of his most finely detailed work.

I shivered when her fingers traced along my lower back. Her hands were cold. It felt nice – the touch – but it wasn't the same and I was glad when she didn't linger.

"It's beautiful, Jasper. It's just like you wanted."

"Edward does good work." When I looked over at him, he raised his glass in a silent toast.

"It was your design, though, your idea."

I didn't correct her. Edward saw the originals, of course, but I asked him not to say anything. I shrugged as I did up my shirt. It's not that I want the credit – I don't. It just feels too personal to share, still, even with her. Someday, I'll bring out the book and she can see the ink-and-paper versions, the originals, of the designs now memorialized on my skin.

. . . . . . . .

Tuesday, July 21, 2009

It took me a month before I pulled out the book. I knew it was there, where it was kept, although I'd never looked at it before. I went through so many other things during that month, but I avoided the book. I had the faintest ideas of what I would find – memories of whisperings, pieced together; half-formed questions from Edward, who obviously knew something... But I didn't want to see it. It was almost as if I ignored it, it wouldn't exist.

After I looked at it the first time, I couldn't stop. I brought it out every night. I would run my fingers lightly over the lines and curves, careful that my hands were clean. I could picture the pen that was used to render the design, and the hand that held it. Every night for a month, I sat on the couch with that sketchbook in my lap.

It took me another two months before I decided to do something with the designs. I took them to Edward and watched as he fleshed them out – not really changing or adding, but making them suitable to cover my back and chest. I didn't want just one, the one that was intended for me – I wanted it all. They were a matched set. One could not exist without the other. They were meant to live and breathe together. I knew this from the moment I saw them spread across the sketchbook's pages. I refused to choose between or separate them.

. . . . . . . .

Friday, July 24, 2009

The first session was the hardest. I was familiar with the procedures, the sounds... Even the initial sting wasn't bad. But it was Edward's station, Edward's chair, Edward's hands. It was Edward and it just wasn't right. For either of us. We stopped halfway through the day's planned work and we almost decided, silently, mutually, to stop. I think it was only his pride in his work and refusal to leave something partially done that kept us going.

When he handed me a mirror so I could see what he'd accomplished in the six and a half hours I'd been sitting there, trying not to think, I dropped it and it shattered as it hit his feet and then the tile. I hadn't expected the wave of emotions that rushed over me when I saw the ink over my heart rising and falling with my breaths. It was two days before I could stand in front of a mirror without a shirt, before I let myself really look at the ink.

It was six weeks before I went back, but it was better that session and each session after. I could see the sketches as they were meant to be seen and it was... right. For the first time in months, something felt right.

. . . . . . . .

Sunday, July 26, 2009

Three months ago, I tried dating. Or, dating tried me. I wasn't looking for someone, but I met her at a bar I sometimes visit after work. She was friendly and genuine and not overbearing. She didn't look at me as if she wanted to fuck me where I sat. I was... reluctant... and couldn't shake the feeling that it was wrong. But I needed to try, needed to know.

We talked. She asked about the ink that was visible at the V of my collar and quietly changed the subject when I hedged an answer. When she blushed and asked for my email address an hour later, I gave it to her. She had been considerate – kind, even – and I let myself believe that maybe I could do it: talk to someone and have a good time, without feeling... well, without feeling nothing.

Three weeks later, she invited me over for dinner; it would be my first home-cooked meal made by someone other than Bella or myself in almost nine months. We had talked enough during two previous "dates" and several emails and she knew there was something I hadn't told her, but she didn't press. She clearly respected me and my boundaries and I respected her in turn.

Maybe that was why we found ourselves in her bed after dinner and a half-assed attempt to watch a movie. I watched as she shyly removed her t-shirt. I touched her slowly at first but then with less restraint as she reacted to me. Instinct took over. I closed my eyes and tried to just feel.

But when she unzipped my jeans and wrapped her hand around me, it was almost game over. I froze, fingers roaming, lips on her neck. She must have misinterpreted my abrupt, silent panic as encouragement because she stroked me, her hand a hot contrast to the sudden iciness in my veins, and when she tried to push my jeans from my hips, one-handed, I lifted from the bed and let her. I still don't know why.

But what I did know, minutes later, buried in her, as her fingertips traced the lines on my chest, as her fingers splayed across the designs there, designs intended for a different pair of eyes, a different pair of hands... Her tiny moans barely registered because I was suddenly in sensory lockdown and couldn't hear, taste, smell, see... It was... it was too much.

And it was too soon. It was too fucking soon.

Just too soon.

. . . . . . . .

Wednesday, July 29, 2009

I used to stare at the sketchbook. Now I stare in the mirror. I study each line, each sweep of the pen, of the needle. Was it just a design or did each line have meaning? Was it random or did each stroke serve a purpose? What did you think about when you made them?

Is this line the wilted corsage you wore to the prom because you were too nice to embarrass me?

Is this one the wood flooring it took us three weeks to pick out and two minutes to scratch?

Does the line that curves up my chest mimic the knife scar on your arm from the time I startled you in the kitchen, or is that just wishful thinking?

Is this one here, which dips and bends, me on my knees in front of you?

Are the rest all of the plans we had?

An "A" swirls between my shoulder blades like something, or someone, protecting me constantly. It seems to have wings.

A "J" cuts across my ribs. I wear it proudly but know it isn't serving its intended purpose. Not like the "A."

With this ink wrapped around me like a blanket, I am comforted as I lie in bed at night. Everywhere I go, it's almost as if I am not alone. Almost.

. . . . . . . .

Friday, July 31, 2009

I am sitting in the car now because it's raining. I don't care about getting myself wet, but I want these words intact until I'm done with them.

I know I could have written more. I should have started months ago. But the words wouldn't come. They still don't flow easily. I hope you'll forgive that this is all I have for you.

I'm including photos of the ink, of the completed designs. Edward did a great job. You would have done better, with your own designs, but he did the best he could, and you would have trusted him with yours, regardless. You can see where he left it almost unfinished at the edges, as if it's waiting for someone to come along and finish her work... your work.

It's done now, as you intended, by today. Today, this day to celebrate. It is all healed, smooth, perfect...

...almost perfect.

I hope that this... finds you. I don't know what to believe anymore but if fire can take, I have to think it can give, as well. It's only fair. I will leave it to bring my words to you.

I love you.

- J.

. . . . . . . .

_**The Seattle Times  
**__Monday, August 3, 2009_

_NORTH QUEEN ANNE, Seattle – A 31-year-old Seattle man was arrested Friday night for desecration of a grave at Mt. Pleasant Cemetery._

_Police say Jasper H. Whitlock, a local teacher and writer, was found after having started a fire on the grave of his late wife, Alice Brandon-Whitlock, around 10:30 Friday night._

_Brandon-Whitlock was killed in a car accident last year on the couple's four-year wedding anniversary. She was co-owner of a popular tattoo studio in downtown Seattle._

_Whitlock faces up to $10,000 in fines and five years in prison._

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**Thanks to Legna for doing all of the wonderful ficwife/beta/symbiote things she does. **

**Also, thanks to LaViePastiche for an early read and thumbs up, even though it made her all emo... well, **_**more**_** emo.**


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